Terms of Use

These Terms of Use govern your use of this site (“Site”) which is owned and operated by The Maytree Foundation (“MAYTREE”). Any person who wishes to use this Site must accept these Terms of Use without change. BY ACCESSING THIS SITE, YOU ARE INDICATING YOUR ACKNOWLEDGMENT AND ACCEPTANCE OF THESE TERMS OF USE AND ALL RELATED POLICIES AND GUIDELINES OF THIS SITE.

These Terms of Use or any other policies or guidelines governing the Site are subject to change by MAYTREE at any time in its sole discretion. Any changes will be effective upon the posting of the revisions on the Site. Your use of the Site will be subject to the most current version of the Terms of Use posted on the Site at the time of such use. Your continued use of this Site after such changes are implemented constitutes your acknowledgment and acceptance of the changes. Please consult these Terms of Use regularly. If you do not agree to any changes to these Terms of Use, please immediately discontinue your use of the Site.

1. Access to This Site

To utilize some of the resources this Site has to offer, you may be asked to provide certain registration details or other information. It is a condition of your use of this Site that all the information that you provide to this Site will be correct, current, and complete. If MAYTREE believes that the information you provide is not correct, current, or complete, MAYTREE has the right to refuse you access to this Site or any of its resources, and to terminate or suspend your access at any time. However, MAYTREE has no obligation to verify the accuracy, currency, completeness or usefulness of any information that you have provided. Certain sections of this Site may only be accessible with the use of a username and password that may be provided to you by MAYTREE upon your completion of MAYTREE’s user registration form. Upon submission of the user registration form to MAYTREE, MAYTREE may provide you, at its sole discretion, which may be unreasonably withheld, with a username and password via electronic mail to the address submitted by you to access the secure sections of this Site. MAYTREE reserves the right to cancel your username and password at its sole discretion, without notice to you, at any time.

2. Restrictions on Use

You may use this Site for your own personal purposes as expressly permitted by this Site. You may not use this Site for any other purpose, including any commercial purpose, without MAYTREE’s express prior written consent. For example, you may not (and may not authorize any other party to) (i) co-brand this Site; (ii) frame this Site; or (iii) hyperlink to this Site, without the express prior written permission of an authorized representative of MAYTREE. For purposes of these Terms of Use, “co-branding” means to display any name, logo, trade-mark, or other means of attribution or identification of any party in such a manner as is reasonably likely to give a user the impression that such other party has the right to display, publish, or distribute this Site or content accessible within this Site or which may confuse a user as the nature of the relationship between any party and MAYTREE. You agree to cease and desist causing any unauthorized co-branding, framing or hyperlinking upon notice from MAYTREE and at all times you will cooperate with MAYTREE following MAYTREE’s discovery of any such illegal activity.

3. Proprietary Information

(a) The Site and any other World Wide Website owned, operated, licensed by MAYTREE accessible from this Site, contains text, graphics, photos, software, logos, icons, Educational Content, as hereinafter defined, and other materials (“Site Content”) furnished by MAYTREE or its licensor. The Site Content is protected under Canadian copyright and trade-mark laws and other laws of Canada and other nations. All Site Content, including the collection, arrangement, and assembly of such content, is the exclusive property of MAYTREE and its licensors. You may not copy, sell, license, transfer, publish, reproduce, modify, display, reverse engineer, decompile, disassemble, adapt, translate, transmit, arrange, bundle, sublicense, export, merge, loan, rent, lease, assign, share, outsource, host, distribute in any way, prepare derivative works based on, re-post, make available to any person or otherwise use, either directly or indirectly, any of the Site Content, in whole or in part, in any form or by any means whatsoever, be they physical, electronic or otherwise, for any public or commercial purpose, without the prior written consent of MAYTREE. Notwithstanding the previous sentence, MAYTREE hereby grants you limited permission to copy, download, reproduce and distribute certain text and graphics accessible on the Site which are specifically identified by MAYTREE as freely downloadable or as educational material for your non-commercial use only (“Educational Content”). For clarity Third Party Content shall not form part of Educational Content and shall be governed by the terms of Section 4. All Educational Content copied, reproduced, distributed or generally made available to the public by you shall contain the MAYTREE copyright notice as identified in Section 3(b) below. You hereby agree that MAYTREE may, in its sole discretion, terminate this right to access, copy, reproduce, distribute and generally make available to the public Educational Content without prior written notice to you. You shall not permit, allow or do anything that would infringe or otherwise prejudice the proprietary rights of MAYTREE or its licensors or allow any third party to access the Site Content. The restrictions set out herein shall not apply to the limited extent the restrictions are prohibited by applicable law.

(b) Permission is granted to you to download and make one printed copy of the Site Content, excluding Educational Content, for your own private, non-commercial use only, without alterations, so long as the following copyright notice is included: “Copyright 1996-2012 The Maytree Foundation. All rights reserved.” You do not acquire any ownership rights by downloading Site Content from the Site.

(c) Trade-marks, service marks, and logos appearing in this Site are the property of MAYTREE or the party that provided the trade-marks, service marks, and logos to MAYTREE. MAYTREE and any party that provided trade-marks, service marks, and logos to MAYTREE retain all rights with respect to any of their respective trade-marks, service marks, and logos appearing in this Site. Nothing contained in this Site should be construed as granting, by implication, estoppel, or otherwise, any license or right to use any trade-mark displayed on this Site.

4. Third Party Content

(a) This Site may also contain information or materials (“Third Party Content”) that are owned or provided by persons other than MAYTREE (“Third Party Providers”). MAYTREE makes no representations or warranties with respect to such Third Party Content and does not undertake to conduct any independent investigation of Third Party Content. Inclusion of information or materials from third parties on this Site does not mean, unless expressly stated otherwise, that MAYTREE or any of its affiliates endorse or agree with such information or materials.

(b) You understand that you have no proprietary rights in the Third Party Content and that the Third Party Providers retain all proprietary right, title or interest, including copyright and trade-mark rights, in their respective Third Party Content.

(c) You may not copy, sell, license, transfer, publish, reproduce, modify, display, reverse engineer, decompile, disassemble, adapt, translate, transmit, arrange, bundle, sublicense, export, merge, loan, rent, lease, assign, share, outsource, host, distribute in any way, prepare derivative works based on, re-post, make available to any person or otherwise use, either directly or indirectly, any of the Third Party Content, in whole or in part, in any form or by any means whatsoever, be they physical, electronic or otherwise, for any public or commercial purpose, without the prior written consent of the Third Party Providers. You shall use your best efforts to stop any such copying or distribution immediately after you become aware of such use.

(d) You are granted a limited license to display on your computer, download, use and make one printed copy of the Third Party Content for your own private, non-commercial use only, so long as (i) you do not modify any such Third Party Content; and (ii) you ensure that any copyright or trade-mark notices contained in the specific Third Party Content are retained. Nothing in this limited license confers any ownership rights in the Third Party Content from any third party who has ownership rights in the Third Party Content available on the Site.

(e) The rights and limitations in this Section 4 are for the benefit of each Third Party Provider, each of which shall have the right to enforce its rights under this section directly and on its own behalf.

5. Linked Sites and Hyperlinks

This Site contains hyperlinks to other sites that are not maintained by, or related to, MAYTREE. Hyperlinks to such sites are provided solely as a convenience to you and do not imply any endorsement by MAYTREE of, any affiliation with or endorsement by the owner of the linked site. MAYTREE has no control over such third party sites. MAYTREE is not responsible for the availability of such external sites and no endorsement of any third party products or services is expressed or implied by any information, material or content referred to or included on or linked from or to the Site. MAYTREE does not assume responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, accessibility and usefulness of the information, data, opinions, advice or statements contained at such sites and your access and use of such third party sites, including any information, material, products and services therein, is solely at your own risk. MAYTREE accepts no liability for any indirect, incidental, exemplary, consequential, punitive or other losses or damages of whatsoever kind arising out of access to or use of any hyperlinked website or any information or reliance on any such content, goods or services available on or through any such linked website. You also understand and agree that MAYTREE’s Privacy Policy is applicable only while you are using the Site. Once you are linked to another website, you should read the privacy statement of that website before disclosing any personal information.

6. Conduct and the Use of the Site and Submissions

(a) MAYTREE expects that you will access and use the Site in a professional, responsible and business-like manner in accordance with applicable laws. As a visitor to the Site, you may have the opportunity to post comments, submit questions or other information or otherwise engage in dialogue with representatives of MAYTREE through the sending of email to the Site. MAYTREE welcomes your content, remarks, suggestions, ideas, graphics, and other information communicated to MAYTREE by you through this Site (collectively, a “Submission” is through info@maytree.com) so long as such Submissions are in accordance with MAYTREE’s content policy, as discussed below in section 6(b) and are not obscene, illegal, threatening, defamatory, invasive of privacy, infringing of third party intellectual property or privacy rights, or otherwise injurious to third parties, and do not consist of or contain software viruses, commercial solicitation, chain letters, political campaigning, or any form of spam. You are prohibited from using a false e-mail address, from impersonating another person or entity, or otherwise misleading MAYTREE as to your identity when you are on the Site or otherwise communicating with MAYTREE.

(b) You hereby grant to MAYTREE a royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, non-exclusive right and license to reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, perform, copy, bundle, market, adapt, transmit, arrange, sublicense, export, merge, transfer, loan, rent, lease, assign, share, outsource, host, make available to any person, display or otherwise use any Submission communicated to MAYTREE by you through this Site (including, without limitation, any ideas, concepts, inventions, know-how, techniques or any intellectual property contained therein) and to incorporate any Submission in other works in any form, media, or technology now known or later developed, including for advertising and promotion purposes, for any purpose, whatsoever, without any duty to account to you. You represent and warrant that you own or otherwise control all of the rights to the Submission that you post; that the Submission is accurate; that the use of the Submission that you supply does not violate these Terms of Use and will not cause injury to any person or entity, and that you will defend, indemnify and hold harmless MAYTREE and/or its affiliates/subsidiaries for all claims resulting from any Submission that you provide to MAYTREE. In addition, you irrevocably waive all of your moral rights as author in respect of such Submission, however arising. MAYTREE will not be required to treat any Submission as confidential, and may use any Submission in its business (including without limitation, for products or advertising) without incurring any liability for royalties or any other consideration of any kind, and will not incur any liability as a result of any similarities that may appear in future MAYTREE operations.

(c) You further agree that you shall use this Site for lawful purposes only and represent and warrant that you will not use the Site to:

(i) download, post, e-mail or otherwise transmit any Submission that promotes partisan political activities or that is unlawful, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, tortious, homophobic, sexist, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, libellous, invasive of another’s privacy, hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable, including but not limited to any Submission which encourages conduct that would constitute a criminal offence, violate the laws of others or otherwise violates any applicable local, provincial, national or international law;

(ii) harm minors in any way;

(iii) download, post, e-mail or otherwise transmit any Submission that you do not have a right to transmit under any law or under contractual or fiduciary relationships (such as insider information, proprietary and confidential information learned or disclosed as part of employment relationships or under nondisclosure agreements);

(iv) download, post, e-mail or otherwise transmit any Submission that infringes, misappropriates, or otherwise violates any third party’s copyright, patent, trade-mark, or other proprietary right of publicity or privacy, or encourages or enables any other party to do so;

(v) use the Site or any Site Content, Submissions or Third Party Content (collectively, “Content”) downloaded through the Site to post, e-mail or otherwise transmit any unsolicited or unauthorized advertising, promotional materials, “junk mail,” “spam,” “chain letters,” “pyramid schemes,” or any other form of solicitation;

(vi) upload, post, e-mail or otherwise transmit any Submission to the Site that contains software viruses or any other computer code, files or programs designed to interrupt, destroy, alter, or limit the functionality of any computer software or hardware or telecommunications equipment or that imposes an unreasonable or disproportionately large load on the Site’s infrastructure or limits the functionality of any MAYTREE or third party computer hardware, software, networks, or hardware or telecommunications equipment;

(vii) interfere with or disrupt the Site or servers or networks connected to the Site, including attempting to interfere with the access of any other user, host or network, including without limitation, overloading, initiating, propagating, participating, directing or attempting any “denial of service” attacks, “spamming”, “crashing”, or “mail-bombing” the Site or disobeying any requirements, procedures, policies or regulations of networks connected to the Site;

(viii) direct bots, spiders, crawlers or any other automated process at MAYTREE’s computer systems or otherwise, create unreasonable load upon any of MAYTREE’s computer hardware, network, storage, input/output or electronic control devices;

(ix) use the Site for any public or commercial purposes, without the express prior written permission of MAYTREE;

(x) intentionally or unintentionally violate any applicable local, provincial, national or international law, rule or regulation applicable in connection with the Site;

(d) Any breach of the above representations, covenants and warranties will result in immediate termination of your use of the Site, and, if appropriate, referral to relevant law enforcement authorities.

(e) MAYTREE will treat any personal information that you submit through this Site in accordance with its Privacy Policy.

7. Privacy Policy

Please click here to read and review MAYTREE’s Privacy Policy, which describes MAYTREE’s privacy policies and practices in detail, as such statement may be amended from time to time by MAYTREE. MAYTREE advises you to check the Privacy Policy on a frequent basis for changes. You hereby consent to the use of your personal information by MAYTREE and/or its Third Party Providers in accordance with the terms and for the limited purposes set forth in the Privacy Policy. By agreeing to these Terms of Use, you acknowledge and agree that certain information about you is subject to MAYTREE’s Privacy Policy.

8. Disclaimer of Warranties/Limitation of Liability

(a) You understand that MAYTREE cannot and does not guarantee or warrant that files available for downloading from the Internet will be free of viruses, worms, Trojan horses or other code that may manifest contaminating or destructive properties. You are responsible for implementing sufficient procedures and checkpoints to satisfy your particular requirements for accuracy of data input and output, and for maintaining a means external to this Site for the reconstruction of any lost data. MAYTREE does not assume any responsibility or risk for your use of the Internet.

(b) You, and not MAYTREE, assume the entire cost of all necessary servicing, repair or correction in the event of any loss or damage arising from the use of this Site or its Content. Any Content downloaded or otherwise obtained through your use of the Site is used by you at your own risk and you will be solely responsible for any damage to your computer systems or loss of data that results from the downloading of such material. MAYTREE does not represent or warrant that the Content, the Site, its servers or email sent from the Site are free from viruses or other harmful components.

(c) The Content is provided for informational purposes only, is not necessarily complete and up-to-date and should not be used to replace any written reports, statements, or notices provided by MAYTREE. Employers, employees and other persons should use the Content in the same manner as any other educational medium and should not rely on the Content to the exclusion of their own professional judgment. Information obtained by using this Site is not exhaustive and does not cover all issues, topics, or facts that may be relevant to your goals.

(d) MAYTREE makes no representations, warranties or conditions regarding the completeness, accuracy, availability or appropriateness of the Site, the Content or its usefulness for your purposes. For greater clarity, MAYTREE does not represent or warrant that (i) the functions or Content contained in this Site will be uninterrupted, reliable, accurate, complete, suitable, valid, truthful, error-free or will meet your requirements in any way; (ii) that defects will be corrected, or that this site or the server that makes it available are free of viruses or other harmful components; (iii) the use of the Content and the Site will be timely, secure, or error-free; (iv) the results that may be obtained from your use of the Content and the Site will be accurate, beneficial or reliable; or (v) the quality of any Content obtained by you through your use of the Site will meet your expectations. The Content may include technical inaccuracies or typographical errors, and MAYTREE may make changes or improvements at any time.

(e) In no event shall MAYTREE, its directors, officers, shareholders, employees, affiliates, subsidiaries, Third Party Providers, service providers, agents or advisors be liable to you or any other person or entity for any direct, indirect, exemplary, incidental, consequential or punitive damages, including lost profits, loss of income, loss of anticipated sales, loss of opportunities, business interruption, failure to realize unexpected savings, damage to property, claims of third parties, loss of goodwill, use, data or other intangible losses or other economic loss arising from: (i) your use or inability to use the Site, the Content or any site to which you hyperlink from the Site; (ii) any third party claims that the use by you of the Content violates any intellectual property right or privacy right; (iii) any failure of performance of the Site or the Content, whether related to error, omission, interruption, defect, delay in operation or transmission, computer viruses or line failure; or (iv) any other matters relating to this Site, any Submissions or the Content, based in contract, negligence, strict liability, fundamental breach, failure of essential purpose or otherwise, whether or not MAYTREE had any knowledge, actual or constructive, that you might incur such damages.

(f) Your use of this Site is at your own risk. Everything on the Site, including the Content, is provided “as is” and “as available” without representations, warranties, guarantees or conditions of any kind, either express or implied. MAYTREE expressly disclaims all representations, warranties, guarantees and conditions, including any implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, quiet enjoyment or non-infringement or those arising out a course of dealing or usage of trade for the SITE to the fullest extent permissible under applicable law. Certain jurisdictions do not allow limitations on implied warranties or conditions or the exclusion or limitation of certain damages. If these laws apply to you, some or all of the above disclaimers, exclusions or limitations may not apply to you, and you may have additional rights.

(h) If, notwithstanding the foregoing, MAYTREE should be found liable for any loss or damages which arise out of or are in any way connected with any of the above described functions or uses of this Site or its Content, the maximum liability of MAYTREE will in no event exceed, in the aggregate, CDN$100.

9. Indemnity

You agree at all times to indemnify, defend and hold harmless MAYTREE, its subsidiaries, affiliates, licensors, Third Party Providers, service providers, employees, contractors, agents, officers, directors, successors and assigns (the “Indemnified Parties”) from and against any claims, losses, judgements, actions, proceedings, damages, costs and expenses (including without limitation, reasonable legal and other fees and disbursements) incurred by any of the foregoing parties due to or resulting from your use or misuse of the Site, the Content, from Submissions that you post to, submit or transmit through the Site or from your violation of these Terms of Use. You will also indemnify and hold the Indemnified Parties harmless from and against any claims brought by third parties arising out of your use of Content from this Site.

10. Security

(a) You are prohibited from using any services or facilities provided in connection with this Site to compromise security or tamper with system resources and/or accounts. The use or distribution of tools designed for compromising security (e.g., password guessing programs, cracking tools or network probing tools) is strictly prohibited. If you become involved in any violation of system security, MAYTREE reserves the right to release your details to system administrators at other sites in order to assist them in resolving security incidents. MAYTREE reserves the right to investigate suspected violations of these Terms of Use.

(b) MAYTREE reserves the right to fully cooperate with any law enforcement authorities or court order requesting or directing MAYTREE to disclose the identity of anyone posting any e-mail messages, or publishing or otherwise making available any materials that are believed to violate these Terms of Use. By accepting this Agreement you waive, and hold MAYTREE harmless from, any claims resulting from any action taken by MAYTREE during or as a result of its investigations and/or from any actions taken as a consequence of investigations by either MAYTREE or law enforcement authorities.

11. MAYTREE’s Use of Cookies

A cookie is a small text file containing a unique identification number that is transferred from the Site to the hard drive of your computer (“Cookie”). A Cookie allows the Site to identify separate visitors to the Site and track users’ activities on the Site.

MAYTREE uses Cookies only to keep track of how many people visit the Site and how frequently each page on the Site is visited. Each individual movement of any user cannot be tracked while on the Site. MAYTREE uses cookies to track page popularity only to be able to improve the quality of the Site.

12. Violations

Please report any violations of these Terms of Use to MAYTREE at info@maytree.com.

13. Applicable Law

These Terms of Use and any action related thereto or related to the Site and the Content shall be governed, controlled, interpreted and defined by and under the laws of the Province of Ontario and the federal laws applicable therein. The United Nations Convention on the International Sale of Goods is explicitly excluded from this agreement. You agree that any action at law or in equity arising out of or relating to these Terms of Use or your use of the Site and the Content will be filed only in a court located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and you hereby irrevocably and unconditionally consent and submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of such courts for the purpose of any such action. Your use of the Site is void where prohibited by laws in jurisdictions to which you are otherwise subject, and you agree not to visit or use the Site or the Content in any such circumstances. Sections 3 , 4 , 6 , 8 , 9 , 10 and 13 shall survive any termination of these Terms of Use for any reason.

14. Termination

You acknowledge and agree that these Terms of Use shall remain in effect for so long as you use this Site. You agree that this agreement can only be terminated by you once you have stopped using the Site. MAYTREE reserves the right to terminate your use of the Site at any time, for any reason, with or without cause, if MAYTREE believes that you are violating these Terms of Use in any way. MAYTREE also has the right, in its sole discretion, to remove any Submissions from the Site. MAYTREE shall not be responsible for maintaining or returning Submissions. You should always maintain a copy of your Submissions. You acknowledge that any termination of this agreement will not discharge you of any of your obligations to pay for any outstanding fees, charges or penalties owed to MAYTREE at the time of termination.

15. Entire Agreement

These Terms of Use and any other legal notices, policies and guidelines of MAYTREE linked to these Terms of Use constitute the entire agreement between you and MAYTREE relating to your use of this Site and supersede any prior understandings or agreements (whether oral or written), claims, representations, and understandings of the parties regarding such subject matter. These Terms of Use may not be amended or modified except in writing or by making such amendments or modifications available on this Site.

16. No Agency; Third Party Beneficiary

MAYTREE is not your agent, fiduciary, trustee, or other representative. Nothing expressed or mentioned in or implied from these Terms of Use is intended or will be construed to give to any person other than the parties hereto any legal or equitable right, remedy, or claim under or in respect to these Terms of Use. These Terms of Use and all of the representations, warranties, covenants, conditions, and provisions hereof are intended to be and are for the sole and exclusive benefit of MAYTREE, you, and relying Third Party Providers.

17. Assignment

You may not assign, convey, subcontract or delegate your rights, duties or obligations hereunder without the prior written consent of MAYTREE. MAYTREE may assign its rights, duties and obligations hereunder without prior written notice to you. This Agreement shall enure to the benefit of and be binding upon the parties and their respective successors and permitted assigns.

18. Severability

If any provision of these Terms of Use is found by a court of competent jurisdiction to be invalid, the parties nevertheless agree that the court should endeavour to give effect to the parties’ intentions as reflected in the provision, and the other provisions of the Terms of Use remain in full force and effect.

19. No Waiver

MAYTREE will not be considered to have waived any of its rights or remedies described in these Terms of Use unless the waiver is in writing and signed by MAYTREE. No delay or omission by MAYTREE in exercising its rights or remedies will impair or be construed as a waiver. Any single or partial exercise of a right or remedy will not preclude further exercise of any other right or remedy. MAYTREE’s failure to enforce the strict performance of any provision of these Terms of Use will not constitute a waiver of MAYTREE’s right to subsequently enforce such provision or any other provisions of these Terms of Use.

20. Headings

The headings used in these Terms of Use are included for convenience only and have no legal or contractual effect and shall not affect the construction or interpretation of these Terms of Use.

21. Electronic Communications

When you visit the Site or send e-mail to us, you are communicating with MAYTREE electronically. You consent to receive communications from MAYTREE electronically. MAYTREE will communicate with you by e-mail or by posting notices on the Site. You agree that all agreements, notices, disclosures, and other communications that MAYTREE provides electronically satisfy any legal requirement that such communications be in writing.